1) Measures to improve financial health of DISCOMs: Ministry of Power notified additional measures including:
- Streamlining process of accounting, reporting, billing and payment of subsidy by States to Distribution Companies (DISCOMs).
- Quarterly report shall be submitted by DISCOMs and State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) shall examine the report.
- Aggregate Technical and Commercial (AT&C) loss reduction trajectory would be approved by State Commissions for tariff determination.
- ATC losses are combination of energy loss and commercial loss.
2) Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC): Recent study calculated that AMOC will collapse with 95% certainty between 2025 and 2095.
- AMOC is a system of ocean currents in the Atlantic Ocean that circulates heat from the tropics towards the North Pole and disseminates cold, saline, dense waters towards the Tropics and even further south towards the South Pole.
- Consequences of a slowing AMOC:
- Sea level rise across the U.S. East Coast.
- Would cool the northern hemisphere and decrease rainfall over Europe.
- Would cause droughts.
- Ocean currents are the continuous, predictable, directional movement of seawater driven by gravity, wind (Coriolis Effect), and water density.
3) Cryptobiosis: Scientists brought microscopic worms back to life after they were frozen in the Siberian permafrost for 46,000 years by entering in to state called cryptobiosis.
- About Cryptobiosis
- Cryptobiosis is the state of an organism when it shows no visible signs of life and when its metabolic activity becomes hardly measurable, or comes reversibly to a standstill.
- In this state organisms can survive complete absence of water and oxygen and withstand other extreme conditions.
- Since metabolism is a defining characteristic of life, cryptobiosis can be termed as a temporary death of an organism.
4) cell-free DNA (cfDNA): CfDNA refers to small fragments of nucleic acids that are released from cells and found outside the cell in body fluids as plasma, urine, and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF).
- cfDNA quantity in the blood increases under pathological conditions such as auto-immune diseases, cancer etc.
- Application of cfDNA:
- Detect genetic abnormalities in foetuses,
- Early detection, diagnosis, and treatment of cancers,
- Monitor immune response after organ transplantation and can be used as a biomarker.
